Hounds Abound (8 page)

The murderer was out there somewhere. Were we in any
danger? I didn’t think so, but I’d still feel relieved when the authorities got there.

“If Bella acts the way I hope she does,” I continued, “then I’ll feel confident she didn’t kill Miles. She did hear an intruder, after all.”

“You should wait till the cops take charge. Let them judge her reaction. If she did kill him—and I’m not saying she did—she could have been lying when she talked to you. Making things up about hearing someone. Or, maybe she did hear someone: Miles. But considering where we found him, this doesn’t look like self-defense.”

He wasn’t wrong. But I figured that as long as we didn’t touch anything—except for his necessary and limited contact with the car door—we weren’t interfering with the investigation.

Bella came out her front door, Sammy in front of her. The dog reached us first and I grabbed his collar before he could dash over to the car. Matt hadn’t completely shut the door. I didn’t want the curious dog to start sniffing and perhaps contaminate the scene even more.

I watched him put his nose into the air, though, and wriggle his erect Malinois ears. What did he sense—anything helpful? Or was he simply acknowledging the presence of death in a canine way?

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Bella said as she reached us. She was dressed more casually than I’d ever seen her—frayed jeans and a tight, faded T-shirt. Her makeup was far from perfect, assuming she even had any on. She looked toward the car. “I’m not surprised to see that, damn it, though I didn’t know he was here. He parked at an angle so
I couldn’t see the car from inside, but my first thought was that my intruder had to be Miles. That’s why I didn’t call the cops. But maybe I should have.”

“Bella, I think you need to look more closely at the car. But please be careful. And remember I’m right here with you.” I began having second thoughts about my plan immediately. Matt was right. If she was a killer, she’d already lied enough times that her reaction now could be meaningless. And if she wasn’t, she was about to receive a terrible shock without any warning from her so-called new friend.

She looked at me quizzically. “Did he leave something on the seat that he intended to gift me with—a stink bomb? Something else I’d hate? Where is he now?” She shook her head and started walking briskly toward the car. I rushed to catch up with her, thinking I should stop her before she reached it, but I was slowed down by holding Sammy back and she was moving too fast. “Honestly, I just wish the jerk would accept how things are and agree to divide our finances fairly. I don’t care whether he likes what I’m doing or not. Save’Em is what I intend to do with my life from now on.”

She was right by the car now. I took hold of her arm, stopping her.

“There is something I should tell you …” I began.

“Listen, he was just playing games with me before, trying to scare me by making all those noises. I hate what he’s doing. I could just kill—”

“Don’t say it,” I warned her.

“But—”

That was when, leaning toward the car window, she screamed.

The sirens now audible in the distance formed an eerie chorus behind Bella’s sobs. A least I’d grabbed the hysterical woman before she could touch the car door.

I should have waited for the cops. Bella’s reaction had definitely convinced me of her innocence, and it might have helped to convince them, too. But surely the hard evidence would do that anyway. Someone’s fingerprints were likely to be on the knife. On the car—besides Matt’s. Other evidence, too, that I wouldn’t even consider looking for.

A police car lunged into the parking lot, and Matt, who’d been watching us intently, hurried over to meet it.

In a short while, I was separated from Bella to await the Robbery Homicide Division detectives and the investigators from the Scientific Investigation Division. I now knew the drill. Not that I wanted to. But this was, amazingly, the third murder to affect me within the last few months.

Interestingly, one of the members of the LAPD who arrived in the second wave of cops was Detective Stefan Garciana. He had been in charge of the investigation when I was suspected of murdering someone I’d despised, right on the HotRescues property. He had been hard on me, but he had also given me a bit of insight into how his mind worked while he conducted investigations. I used some of his techniques when I helped to find the culprit in another murder where my former mentor, Mamie, had been accused.

“Ah, Ms. Vancouver,” he said, approaching me. “We meet again. And at another animal shelter, I understand.” He glanced around, as if assessing our surroundings. Only part of the Save’Em shelter was visible from this rear parking lot, but I had no doubt that he would get to see the rest of it soon.

“Yes,” I confirmed. “This is Save Them All Sanctuary.”

“Are you affiliated with this place, too?”

“No, but I’m friends with its administrator. Plus, I really like its approach to caring for pets with special needs.”

“So it’s a better place for animals than HotRescues?”

“Of course not. It’s different, but—” I glared into his amused dark eyes, then shut up. He was just trying to goad me. He had been good at that before. But I’d learned how not to react—most of the time. I hadn’t seen him for a few months, though, so I had to reboot the lessons I’d learned.

Garciana wasn’t a bad-looking guy, with his dusky Hispanic features, but because of his job and his attitude I found him as attractive as a coyote stalking a cat. He was thin, with wavy dark hair and expressive eyebrows. He wore the same kind of black suit I had seen him in before.

As I watched, his amusement disappeared. He was obviously ready to get to work.

Bella sat on a lawn chair outside her house with Sammy’s comforting head on her lap, looking pale and frightened as a uniformed cop questioned her. Matt was closer to the car, from which paramedics had removed Miles’s body, then covered it to await investigators.

That meant I had Garciana all to myself to question. Even though I was sure he figured he would have me all to himself to interrogate.

He would soon learn better.

“Why don’t you tell me your version of what happened here.” He regarded me with a gaze suggesting he anticipated that, whatever I said, it would be filled with lies, or at least butt-saving exaggerations.

“Here’s the short form.” I proceeded to tell him about Bella’s frightened call, my arrival with Matt, and our discovery of Miles’s body.

“Okay, how about a longer form? I think there must be some helpful details that you’re leaving out.”

I grinned, crossed my arms, and leaned against the rear of the building. “I’ll tell you what I know, and what I think. But I haven’t yet figured out who the least likely suspect is. I’ll want to stay in touch with you as you conduct your investigation. We should be able to help each other that way.” I just wanted to hassle him right back. I had no interest in getting involved any more than I already was.

His gaze became half stony, half amused. Maybe it was the way his eyebrows turned into a waving caterpillar of multiple expressions. “I think I’d better call our Personnel Division folks. I didn’t know you were now a detective with the LAPD.”

“Wouldn’t want to be,” I told him. “I’ve had more than enough contact with murder cases to know I never want to be near any again. But I’ve also seen that some members of your department like to take the easy way out—choose the most obvious suspect and ignore other possibilities.” I
cocked my head as I regarded him. “You, of course, told me that you like to focus on the least likely suspect, too.”

But no matter what he had professed to be his method, I had seemed the most likely killer to him in the case where he’d investigated and I’d been closely involved. He had latched on to me and had only let go when I’d helped to turn his sights onto the real culprit.

He hadn’t been involved in the last case I’d had to look into, for my old mentor’s sake. His counterpart in that case, Detective Joy Greshlam, had been even harder, in some ways, to convince of the truth, but I’d been able to help there as well—with a little assistance from my security manager Brooke’s guy friend Antonio, who was a detective with the LAPD’s Gang and Narcotics Division.

“I gather from this silliness that you want to direct me away from whoever you believe to be the most likely suspect. You again?”

I shook my head. “No. From what I’ve already told you, I’m sure you’ve glommed onto the person who’s the most obvious possibility.”

He nodded. “I assume you’re talking about the vic’s ex-wife.”

“Right. But like I told you, she called me really frightened about the noises she heard. Apparently either the victim or the murderer, or both, were sneaking around the grounds of Save’Em. And when she saw Miles’s body, she really freaked out.”

“So she’s either very innocent or very smart. Tell you what, Ms. Vancouver. I’m not about to let you interfere in another police investigation. But tell me what you know
about the situation and what you suspect. You’ve been helpful before and I have grown to respect your opinion, so I’ll make a special note of what you say that could lead to showing that Ms. Frankovick is innocent, and will keep that at the forefront of my mind during the investigation. If you’re wrong, I won’t be able to help her, or you. If you’re right, then I’ll already be sifting through other leads with the assumption that the ex-wife isn’t the killer. That’s the best I can do.”

I stared at him for a long moment under the dim parking lot lights. I’d been so focused on him that I’d lost track of how many people were arriving, the sounds of a multitude of voices—as well as a chorus of loud barks in the buildings around us.

Those who were barking were the main reason I wanted Bella to be innocent. It wasn’t just our new friendship. If she had to fight an arrest for murder, who would be in charge here at the shelter? Who would help the poor creatures whose causes she had taken up and now championed?

No, I couldn’t really count on Detective Garciana to keep me informed. I would, however, keep him informed about everything I learned that would help to clear Bella.

Not that I’d be searching much this time, but I would certainly keep my ears open.

“That sounds fair enough,” I said, stretching the truth like the smallest rubber band. “As long as you not only keep an open mind, but give Bella the benefit of any doubts you have—and I’m sure you’ll have a lot if you continue to investigate—I know you’ll find who the real killer is.”

But as I walked away from him, toward Matt, who was talking with another man in a suit, I had to steel myself
against how my mind already pondered Miles Frankovick’s life, friends, and acquaintances. It might take more than Detective Garciana’s open mind to figure out who had hated Miles even more than Bella—and who had killed him.

But it wouldn’t be me.

The media were coming. That was a given, in a situation like this. I glanced around the parking lot, which still bustled as if it was a set for one of the popular TV crime shows. Of course I’d heard that fictional shows depicting crime scene investigations were just that: fiction. They supposedly took a lot of liberties in the interest of enhancing the drama.

Even so, the reality seemed pretty dramatic to me.

In any event, I didn’t know whether the news vultures stuck GPS trackers on all police cars or just eavesdropped on supposedly secure communications between cops, or how they did it. All I knew was that in the prior situations in which I’d been involved, they had almost immediately shoved their microphones and intrusive questions into my face and the face of everyone else around.

I hadn’t seen any media sorts yet, but I was still in the
parking lot that was now secured by the authorities. Even if some had arrived, they were probably being kept away, at least for now. Which meant they were likely to pounce on anyone who emerged from the Save’Em facility. I didn’t want to talk to any of them, or even be accosted with a microphone.

Maybe it was a good thing that I couldn’t leave yet anyway. Matt was still being questioned, and he had driven us here.

There was one TV personality I should contact now, though. Carlie wasn’t a media sort in the problematic tradition of reporters and paparazzi. Even so, a murder connected with a very special pet sanctuary like Save’Em would be of interest to her—especially since she had met Bella and already intended to film a show here soon.

Consequently, I slipped onto the walkway between the rear of the main building, where the special-needs animals were housed, and the separate cat building. The crime scene investigators were buzzing around doing their job, but that area remained fairly empty and no one stopped me from heading in that direction. The light was even dimmer than in the parking lot, and as long as I stayed nearer to the cat building than the main one the constant barks remained in the background rather than being so loud they interrupted my thoughts.

I pulled my BlackBerry from my large purse and called Carlie. Only then did I take a quick look at what time it was: about two in the morning. I expected the call to go straight to voice mail, but instead I heard a groggy, “What’s wrong, Lauren?”